Weekend storm expected to bring overnight winds and more rain
Technically, it’s still summer, but Friday felt like winter. The rain fell hard on Southern Vancouver Island, where total precipitation was expected to be in the 35-millimetre range through the evening.
Langford resident Imran Daj couldn’t be happier about it.
“I’m more than happy to see the rains come,” said Daj.
After an extremely dry two months, those rains caused chaos on the roads during the morning commute on the West Shore.
“We had multiple collisions that we had to attend to,” said Const. Alex Berube of West Shore RCMP.
The first was a BC Transit bus that rolled over while swerving to avoid another vehicle on the Trans Canada Highway near Thetis Lake.
“Fortunately, there were no passengers inside the bus,” said Berube. “The driver of the bus was transported to hospital by ambulance to be treated for non-life-threatening injuries.”
Next were two separate accidents that happened in and around the intersection of Whale Road and Goldstream Avenue in Colwood.
Following those, a female pedestrian was hit in the intersection of Langford Parkway and Phipps Road in Langford. She was not seriously hurt.
“Motorists are urged to slow down in wet conditions (and) turn on their lights to be more visible,” said Berube.
This weekend’s storm is expected to hit the east side of Vancouver Island, north of Nanaimo, the hardest.
In Courtenay, water pooled and driving conditions were challenging. People there can expect 50 to 80 millimeters of rain by the end of Friday.
“No doubt, we’re going to see some outages up and down the island,” said Ted Olynyk, community relations manager with BC Hydro.
As of Friday afternoon, BC Hydro saw roughly 5,000 customers without power and was expecting to see more outages over night. Winds are expected to pick up to gusts of 70-to-80 kilometers per hour throughout the evening.
“I’m sure with what trees have experienced this summer – you know, the extreme heat, the long prolonged drought – it’s weakened them,” said Olynyk. “So we’re going to see branches come down. We’re going to see trees come down.”
“Really, right now, we’re just welcoming this rain because our numbers are so low, we’re so far behind,” said Warren Dean, CTV Vancouver Island weather specialist.
From June until Friday, the weather monitoring station at the Victoria International Airport has seen only 48.6 millimeters of rain. The last time the station recorded more than 10 millimetres of rain in a single day was in February.
“It’s one of those situations where it’s nice to get, it’s happening in a very short amount of time and it’s pretty intense,” said Dean. “We just have to keep looking out for a lot of factors that could be dangerous.”
The rains and winds are expected to taper off as we get through the weekend and by late next week, we should be back to summer-like conditions once again.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Cuban government apologizes to Montreal-area family after delivering wrong body
Cuba's foreign affairs minister has apologized to a Montreal-area family after they were sent the wrong body following the death of a loved one.
What is changing about Canada's capital gains tax and how does it impact me?
The federal government's proposed change to capital gains taxation is expected to increase taxes on investments and mainly affect wealthy Canadians and businesses. Here's what you need to know about the move.
Quebec nurse had to clean up after husband's death in Montreal hospital
On a night she should have been mourning, a nurse from Quebec's Laurentians region says she was forced to clean up her husband after he died at a hospital in Montreal.
'Anything to win': Trudeau says as Poilievre defends meeting protesters
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is accusing Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre of welcoming 'the support of conspiracy theorists and extremists,' after the Conservative leader was photographed meeting with protesters, which his office has defended.
Fair in Ontario, flurries in Labrador: Weather systems make for an erratic spring
"It's a bit of a complicated pattern; we've got a lot going on," said Jennifer Smith of the Meteorological Service of Canada in an interview with CTVNews.ca on Wednesday. "[As is] typical with weather, all of these things are related."
Boeing's financial woes continue, while families of crash victims urge U.S. to prosecute the company
Boeing said Wednesday that it lost US$355 million on falling revenue in the first quarter, another sign of the crisis gripping the aircraft manufacturer as it faces increasing scrutiny over the safety of its planes and accusations of shoddy work from a growing number of whistleblowers.
Police tangle with students in Texas and California as wave of campus protest against Gaza war grows
Police tangled with student demonstrators in Texas and California while new encampments sprouted Wednesday at Harvard and other colleges as school leaders sought ways to defuse a growing wave of pro-Palestinian protests.
Bank of Canada officials split on when to start cutting interest rates
Members of the Bank of Canada's governing council were split on how long the central bank should wait before it starts cutting interest rates when they met earlier this month.
Northern Ont. lawyer who abandoned clients in child protection cases disbarred
A North Bay, Ont., lawyer who abandoned 15 clients – many of them child protection cases – has lost his licence to practise law.